


Happiness Is Not A Horse, You Cannot Harness It

by otter



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Competency, Horses, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-05
Updated: 2013-01-05
Packaged: 2017-11-23 18:35:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/625331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otter/pseuds/otter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek's expecting the new guy. He's expecting another mostly-useless college kid who doesn't know one end of a horse from the other, and Derek doesn't have the time to babysit. What he's not expecting is Stiles Stilinski, who carries on conversations with the livestock and gets maybe a little too chummy with Isaac and is really kind of stupidly perfect in every way. And it's just <i>distracting,</i> that's all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happiness Is Not A Horse, You Cannot Harness It

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DevilDoll](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DevilDoll/gifts).



> I am going to attempt to keep these notes brief, oh dear god:  
> 1\. I started writing this after a nine-hour shift of driving horses in the worst possible weather and I might’ve been kind of delirious and hypothermic, and it’s possible that the delirium has just continued since then every time I open up the document. WHATEVA I DO WHAT I WANT. (By which I mean I was not brave enough to have this beta-read because if anybody pointed out how truly ridiculous it was I was going to cry, so I hope you’ll be forgiving.)  
> 2\. I learned to drive in the American west with heavy working horses. I’ve mainly used the terms and voice commands and whatnot as I learned them, or what Internet forums inform me are most common in the region. What I have discovered in my driving career is that the terminology varies widely not just from person to person and not just by country but also by social strata. The only thing I can say definitively is about driving is that everybody you meet will staunchly defend their technical terms as the _truly_ correct terms (my first driving teacher would have a Finstock-style fit if you called the lines “reins” instead, but apparently everybody else in the world prefers “reins”?). So essentially, your mileage may vary; hopefully if you know how to drive you won’t cringe too much at all the things that differ from how you learned, and if you don’t know how to drive, I really hope I won’t hopelessly confuse you with technical terminology.  
>  3\. Also as far as setting goes… as far as I know no place like the facility described here actually exists. If it does — particularly if the staff are Hoechlin-level attractive — please let me know and I will move there immediately. What I’ve written is a conglomeration of several different facilities I’ve visited or volunteered with and a lot of wishful thinking and handwaving; I hope you’ll forgive me if it’s not terribly plausible or scientifically accurate or whatever.  
> 4\. HAHAHAHA BRIEF. LOLZ.

Derek’s not really expecting what he finds in the barn.

He’s expecting the new guy, of course; he’s known about that for a couple of days, and it’s not like Laura and her new crutches and her complete inability to do anything useful around the place are any kind of secret. So he knows that there’s going to be a stranger around the farm, and he knows that it’s some local kid on winter break from college. He knows that Laura says the kid is “qualified,” which probably means he’s both cute and clueless, and Derek’s reasonably certain that he’s going to end up both hating the kid _and_ planning ways to get him fired. The last time they had a temporary college kid in here, the guy was _hopeless_ and Derek ended up pulling the little bastard’s weight. (Fucking Greenberg, Derek _still_ hates that kid and he hasn’t even seen him in _two years._ )

And Derek already has plenty to do with his own workload, because they’re just swinging into their busiest season, which has always been hectic, even when Derek was a little kid. Now it’s worse because Uncle Peter and Aunt Sarah moved to Washington state this year and they took their four kids with them, so that’s half the farm’s workforce right there. Not to mention that Derek’s mother has gone insane and actually invited the schools _and_ churches in town to come in by the _bus-load_ , because a visit to the Beacon Hills Wildlife Preservation Center is an _educational experience._ Like they aren’t already going all out through the whole Christmas break even without offering the whole town a personal invitation. With Laura out of commission for anything but office work, Derek’s expecting that everybody who’s left will be ready for death by the time Christmas actually rolls around. So essentially the entire season is shaping up to be a disaster when it’s only just starting, and Derek’s been stewing all day about this new kid and how much he’s going to completely screw up Derek’s life, so when he walks into the barn he’s just a little bit surprised, is all.

There are several things surprising about the situation, actually. The first thing is that the kid’s already got his team caught, and that he’s actually managed to fetch the right horses. He’s been assigned Abbott and Costello, one of the farm’s most seasoned and easy-going teams, but they aren’t exactly simple to pick out in a crowd. They’re both big, solid Percherons, well-matched in both size and color, their coats a handsome dappled gray, and they’re half-brothers, so they look pretty alike. But since Derek’s parents and grandparents and great-grandparents all bred their own stock from their own lines, nearly all of their horses are handsome, solid, and dappled gray; Abbott and Costello are particularly easy to confuse with Simon and Ben, who they share pasture with, _and_ Large and Sawyer, who live in the next pasture down. There are days when even Derek has a hard time telling them apart — particularly the days when they’ve all disguised themselves liberally with mud and grass stains — and Derek’s grown up with them all, still has incredibly vivid memories of helping Simon take his first few wobbling steps on his thick baby legs.

So the fact that the kid’s managed to pull in the right team is pretty impressive; it means he’s either some sort of teamster savant, or somebody helped him. The former is easier to believe than the latter, because Laura’s usual brand of very specific direction when there are new helpers around is to point them toward the pastures and tell them to bring in “the gray horse,” and then rebuffing all of their subsequent attempts to coax from her any sort of clarity about _which_ gray horse it was exactly that she wanted. Derek once found a work-study intern from Beacon Hills High standing in the middle of one of the pastures, clutching a halter and weeping. It’s a running joke that just never gets old, at least not to Laura.

The kid hasn’t just tied up the horses and waited for further instructions, either, which is good because Laura probably just sent him out to the barn and told him Derek would help him, while simultaneously not bothering to tell Derek the kid was around. (She’s seriously the worst choice ever for administrative manager, but somehow everything ends up getting done almost in spite of her, and better her stuck dealing with visitors and grant applications and permits than Derek.) The kid’s out here early enough that he’s going to have plenty of time to get used to his team before the crowds start showing up, and he’s already hard at work even without anyone telling him what to do, which is more than Derek can say for many of the trainees he’s been saddled with. Actually, it’s more than he can say for _any_ of them, though in their cases if they’d taken any initiative they might’ve gotten themselves killed, so it’s probably all been for the best.

This kid seems to know his way around a horse, though; he’s found the grooming supplies and he’s already made some good headway; there are little piles of dirt and gravel around the horses’ feet from where the kid’s picked their hooves clean, and Derek knows for a fact that both of them were wearing a fair bit of mud earlier in the day, which has all been scraped away. The hay’s been brushed out of their manes and their tails are even neatly braided and tied up. The kid’s going over Costello with a body brush, and the strokes of bristles against horseflesh are short and efficient, raising up the last of the dust from the horse’s coat.

Derek leans against the wall of one of the box stalls, just inside the rolling breezeway door, and watches the kid for a long moment, marveling at the unfamiliar idea that Laura has actually hired someone based on _competence_. Then the kid completely shatters the illusion of his perfection for the job just by talking.

“You’re a good-looking guy, aren’t you?” the kid says.

Derek startles a little, because _what the fuck,_ he didn’t even realize that the kid had heard him come in, and he’s certainly not expecting their new teamster to start the day off by making completely bizarre passes at his boss before they’ve even introduced themselves.

But then the kid goes on, still without turning around, and he says, “You’ve got a seriously awesome butt, and I’m not just saying that. Like, your dapples are out of control amazing-looking. I bet you use that coat-boosting shampoo, am I right?” and Derek realizes that the kid’s not awkwardly trying to hit on _Derek,_ he’s just making absolutely absurd conversation with the _horse._

Costello doesn’t seem to mind it, anyway; he’s just dozing contentedly at the tie rail, enjoying the spa treatment while the kid natters on about what an awesome holiday they’re going to have together and what a great team they’re going to make and how excited Stiles is about seeing some wolves on the Preserve because _wolves,_ seriously, how cool is that? Apparently Scott’s going to be really jealous, whoever Scott is.

Derek just watches, somewhat in awe of the never-ending stream of nonsense coming out of the kid’s mouth, but the kid at least doesn’t seem to be expecting the horses to answer back, so he’s not _literally_ crazy; if anything, the constant word-vomit seems to be a product of nervousness. The kid;s a little twitchy and kind of hyper, but the horses don’t really take any notice, and his hands on them are steady, so Derek’s not really worried. Well, he’s not really worried about _that,_ anyway, and he’s certainly not worried about Abbott and Costello; they’ll take care of their driver, they always do.

As much as he’d like to continue listening to their new teamster as he digs himself into a canyon of delayed embarrassment, Derek has his own horse to harness today, and he’s going to need to help the kid out too. He really should stop lurking and wasting time, even if he’s enjoying the show.

And he actually _is_ enjoying the show, but not just because it’s kind of hilarious. The kid’s not at all the sort of guy Laura would usually hire for a job like this, because he’s wearing neither cowboy hat nor Wranglers. He mostly just looks like the college student that he is; he’s got on well-worn jeans that are mildly fashionable, and a heavy lined hoodie with the hems of a couple of untucked undershirts showing at the bottom. His boots are broken in and scuffed, which is always a good sign, and they’re just sensible work boots, not any sort of over-the-top, ridiculously-tooled cowboy boot. His hair’s buzzed short and he doesn’t look like he’d fit in at _all_ at Saturday night line-dancing, so basically for once, Laura has not hired her type. She might or might not know it, but she’s kind of hired _Derek’s_ type: even aside from the casual competence and the odd but endearing nervous habits, the kid’s kind of nice to look at, and he’s also not really a kid. His hoodie’s a little oversized so it makes him look more slender than he probably really is, but the lines of his face are strong and defined, and even the boyish upturn of his nose isn’t enough to make him look like anything less than a grown man. Young, maybe, but not _that_ young.

Which is… not actually a helpful thought, if Derek’s going to get anything done today. So he straightens himself up, steps all the way into the barn breezeway, and clears his throat.

The kid actually _yelps_ , and spins, and fumbles the brush he’s holding; he almost drops it, then recovers with an ungraceful two-handed desperate grab, almost drops it again, and then finally gets a solid hold on it. His whole body rebounds back against Costello, who doesn’t even react, and the kid ends up with one arm flung over Costello’s back in a desperately casual pose, like the horse is his own personal version of a really comfortable armchair.

“Oh, um, hi,” the kid says, in a tone of voice that _almost_ implies he’s going to follow it up with, _You come here often?_

“Hi,” Derek says, voice flat, expression stern, because it’s more than slightly funny to watch the way the kid’s eyes widen like he thinks he’s about to be in serious trouble. Nobody around here is _ever_ intimidated by Derek, so sue him if he wants to take advantage of being the boss of somebody who’s apparently easily impressed.

“You must be Derek?” the kid says, and the words are a statement but the phrasing is a question. The kid swallows like he’s screwing his resolve to the sticking place and then he steps out from in between the two horses and holds out his hand. His fingers are blunt and his hand is broad; there’s dirt tracing out each line and crease in his palm, but he doesn’t seem to care how filthy he already is, or maybe he just doesn’t think Derek will care, because he smiles wide and bright when Derek takes his hand with his own firm grip. “I’m Stiles.”

“That’s a name?” Derek says, and raises his eyebrow.

Stiles just snorts, lets Derek’s hand go, and turns back to Costello to finish cleaning off the top of his rump with a few casual swipes of the brush. “Please, you’ve got a very big horse named ‘Large,’ let’s not throw stones here, buddy.”

Derek shrugs, but he can feel a grin pulling at the corner of his mouth, whether he likes it or not. “How’d you know which horses to get? Did Laura take you out to the pastures? She’s supposed to be taking it easy on that leg.”

Stiles laughs. “Nah, she just told me their names, pointed me in the right general direction and said, ‘It’s the two gray ones, you can’t miss them.’ She’s a little bit evil, isn’t she?”

“Depends on how you define ‘a little bit,’” Derek says. He circles around to Abbott’s off side and starts scratching at the gelding’s withers until Abbott’s lip starts curling with pleasure. “How many tries did it take you figure out which were the right ones?”

“Oh, just the one,” Stiles says, and the fact that Derek is not prepared to believe him must show, because Stiles throws the brush back into the bucket with a satisfied look on his face and explains. “I mean, harness horses are usually trained to voice command, right? So I stood by the pastures and called their names and then said ‘Walk,’ and then I went and caught the two who automatically looked up and started walking.”

Later, Derek will pinpoint this as the moment he first falls a little in love with Stiles. Right now, it just makes Derek want to do something kind of filthy with his mouth.

He restrains himself though, because he’s a grown-up with responsibilities and also he’s pretty sure Laura would somehow find out and he’d never hear the end of it if he took their newest employee aside to blow him in a box stall. It’s a near thing, though. It’s near enough that there’s a little catch in Derek’s voice as he says, “Right, that’s good thinking. Um, let me show you the harness room, and I’ll help you get these boys dressed.”

Derek expects things to somehow magically get better once he gets used to being around Stiles, but that doesn’t really happen. Derek shows him into the harness room, and the concept in there isn’t very hard to figure out; each horse has his own harness that’s been painstakingly fitted to that individual alone, and each harness is carefully hung from its own hook, under a plaque bearing the name of the horse it belongs to. (Aunt Sarah painted the plaques by hand and they’re kind of beautiful and Derek won’t ever admit that he dusts them carefully on a bi-weekly basis.) The harness room is tidy and well-organized because everyone knows that if they mess it up Derek will _cut a bitch._

He tells Stiles so, very intently, staring into Stiles’ eyes to let him know how incredibly serious this is, and Stiles only nods back gravely, and says he understands.

“I solemnly swear that I will never fuck up your shit,” Stiles tells him, expression earnest and voice sober, and he’s got a frighteningly good straight face.

It’s not as good as Derek’s, though, because Derek manages to hold it together and not even crack a grin, at least until Stiles turns his back and heads for the harness that’s labeled “Costello,” at which point Derek takes a moment to smile like an idiot to himself and just embrace the fact that Stiles is his new favorite, he has a massive crush on Stiles, and this situation is not likely to improve at all.

It’s certainly not helped by Stiles’ handling of the harness, which is both practiced and kind of hot. Derek keeps all of the harness in one piece, which makes it faster to put on but also makes it a little more difficult to handle, not to mention hard to unravel for anyone who isn’t familiar with all the component parts. He’s had more than one newbie trip all over themselves and make a complete mess out of the harness just trying to walk the stuff out to the horse. Stiles doesn’t have any problem with it, though. He runs his hand along the inside of the thick leather collar, checking that it’s really as clean as it looks (it is; this is another of the things that Derek is extremely serious about), and then he slings the collar over one shoulder. He picks up the rest of the harness just as easily, piling first the breeching, then the spider, back pad, and hames all up over the other shoulder.

The harness is all thick leather and metal and it’s not light, which is definitive proof that Stiles is stronger than he looks; he puts the harness to the horse with similar ease, slipping the collar gently over Costello’s head and into place around his neck with one hand while his other arm effortlessly supports the rest of the harness. Then he shuffles his grip around until he has the hames in both hands, swings them into place on the collar, and settles the rest of the harness across Costello’s back just as easily. He handles the parts deftly and carefully; nothing so much as slaps against the horse, who’s still dozing even as Stiles is tugging the harness into place and bracing his shoulder into the collar to tighten the hames.

Derek feels more than satisfied that Stiles doesn’t really need supervision. He goes back into the harness room to grab Abbott’s gear, and gives himself a silent but strident pep talk about not sexually harassing his parents’ employees.

Stiles doesn’t make restraint easy, though. While they’re harnessing the horses he rolls out a steady stream of chatter, in which he reveals, in no particular order and not always with any sort of concept of a segue, a string of facts including: Stiles is a Beacon Hills native, he’s the sheriff’s son, he’s studying ecology with a minor in agriculture at Cal State Shasta, he learned to drive on Alan Deaton’s all-organic all-horsepowered farm where he’s worked pretty much every summer since he was thirteen, and he thinks Doritos are overrated and Cheetos should be considered the One True Chip — Derek can hear the capitalization — even if they aren’t really technically a chip, as such.

The avalanche of words would possibly be overwhelming, if Derek wasn’t occasionally taking a mental break from it all by tuning the words out and getting kind of hypnotized with watching Stiles’ mouth move. He’s pretty sure Stiles doesn’t notice.

Between the two of them it takes no time at all to have the team ready to go, and Derek is seriously beginning to reconsider his stance on propositioning employees, even goes so far as to open his mouth to say Jesus-Christ-he-doesn’t-even-know-what, when somebody else walks in and saves him from himself.

“Hey, sorry I’m late,” Isaac says, and he’s trying to make up for it by being in a massive hurry now because he’s still struggling with the straps of his insulated bibs and he’s got himself half-tangled in them like an animal in a snare. “You must be Stiles! I’m Isaac, I’m going to be riding shotgun with you today and imparting all of my worldly knowledge to you. Hey, you guys got them harnessed already, great, that’s awesome! Thanks, Derek!”

Derek just shrugs, because he’s not entirely sure whether Isaac is thanking him for helping Stiles with the team or thanking him for the way Derek is rescuing him from his own clothes, freeing a trapped arm and untwisting the straps on the bibs as he settles them in their proper places on Isaac’s shoulders.

“Stiles seems to know his way around a harness,” Derek says, and tries not to sound too approving, because he’s pretty sure it’s actually weird to be sexually aroused by a guy’s prowess with a collar unless you’re in a certain kind of subculture and you’re talking about an entirely different kind of collar and Derek is _not going there._ “I don’t think it’ll take much to get him flying solo.”

“Oh yeah?” Isaac says, and gives Stiles a speculative look, which on Isaac mostly just means that he looks like a squirrel. A squirrel that’s trying to decide where it left its cache of peanuts and whether it left the oven on. “The Derek Hale seal of approval, that’s a lot to live up to right off the bat,” Isaac says, and Stiles kind of inexplicably _flushes,_ what is _that,_ what does _that_ mean? Derek doesn’t really have time to work it out because the next thing Isaac says is, “Okay, new kid, you can drive them right out of the barn; we’ll get these two hooked up to a vehicle and see what you’re made of.”

Isaac deftly unclips both horses from the tie rail, and Stiles already has the lines in his fingers, the trailing ends draped over his shoulder. Abbott and Costello prick their ears up when they feel the tension on lines from their driver, and they pivot neatly away from the rail and down the breezeway under Stiles’ light, steady hands.

Derek watches them go — watches _Stiles_ , doesn’t even pretend not to — and when they’re gone he takes a deep breath, gives himself one long moment to savor the memory of Stiles’ long-fingered touch on those lines. Then he pulls himself together, takes a halter and lead rope off the peg next to the harness room door, and goes to catch his own horse.

He really does have enough to do to keep him busy; it’s their opening day for the Christmas season, always their busiest time of year as the locals who typically forget the farm is there all suddenly come out in flocks to drink hot cider, sing Jingle Bells with varying levels of competence, look at the animals, and take in the ridiculous Christmas light display along the farm’s winding entrance road. The lights are always a special kind of hell because Derek has to help put them up and it takes a solid week — just trying to survive it is the main reason he works out so much year-round — but he has to admit that it’s a good idea, because the last few years since they started the tradition their ticket sales have gone through the roof, and the money’s helping them afford the fencing for an expansion of the wolf enclosures.

Derek recognizes the public is a necessary evil for the work they’re doing, but he’s also not the world’s most sociable man, so he’s not at all afraid to use his senior position to force the more gregarious members of their crew — which is basically everyone who is not Derek — into the jobs that involve dealing with people for hours on end. Isaac and Stiles are doing one of the farm’s most public-facing jobs today, driving the big people-moving sledges that take tours around the outside of the center’s enclosure fences so their passengers can try to catch a glimpse of one of the center’s eighteen wolves, three bears, two bobcats and one extremely elusive Canadian lynx, while the drivers tell them about the center’s captive breeding and conservation programs.

The tour drops off next to the old homestead barn, which has been converted into a wildlife rehabilitation center, and where children grumpy from the cold of the sledge ride can warm up and coo over all the little native birds and small mammals that are being nursed back to health there for release into the wild. It’s a good circuit for visitors, because that leaves them walking out the back of the rehab center in a good mood, having just been overwhelmed with cuteness from watching Derek’s little sisters bottle-feeding baby squirrels, and none of them ever seem to mind much that Derek himself goes about his work mostly silently with an attitude that doesn’t invite questions.

Derek’s working on the forested edge of the property with Little, the decided not-little black Percheron who is normally Large’s partner. Derek spent half the day yesterday selectively felling trees so they’re ready to be limbed and moved; today he’ll be doing public demonstrations of the farm’s sustainable forestry practices, skidding the logs out along the perimeter track to the other side of the horse barn, where he’ll later inevitably be tasked with cutting the logs into rounds, and then chopping the rounds into quarters for firewood.

(Derek always begs to be allowed to use the gas-powered wood splitter that his parents use. Laura always says that during the holiday season with so many people around, it’s important to demonstrate safe hand-cutting techniques so people will learn not to chop their own legs off when they’re swinging the ax for their own firewood. Derek’s pretty sure it’s one hundred percent bullshit because he saw this year’s outgoing informational postcards and the ones addressed to women’s groups and book clubs had hand-written notes at the bottom with Derek’s wood-cutting schedule written out.)

The assignments are fairly ideal, anyway, because Stiles seems more than capable of rambling on at length to groups of strangers, and Derek has stealthily positioned the hot drinks stand manned by his fourteen-year-old brother Petey — who is Very Serious About Environmental Stewardship — right next to the rope line blocking off Derek’s work area. Derek can stay well clear of the crowds — since Derek’s log-skidding is potentially dangerous to them and their question-asking is annoying to him — and Petey will end up handling the crowds for him, because Petey is constitutionally incapable of missing an opportunity to sound like an expert on any subject at all.

It’s ideal, really, except that the loop Isaac and Stiles will be driving with the sledge stops on the far side of the rehab barn, so Derek only catches glimpses of them throughout the day. Mostly he’s not looking very hard, because log-skidding really isn’t the kind of thing that he can get away with devoting only half of his attention to, even if Little is perfectly capable of pulling logs on this route without any input from Derek at all. Still, Derek tries to make it a point to pause each time he hears the sledge coming, so he can at least glance up as they pull by to make sure the new kid’s doing okay. On their way in with passengers he can hear Isaac giving the tail end of his speech and directing the visitors into the rehab barn; after that he can see the both of them for a moment, standing companionably at the front rail of the sledge, hip to hip and closer together than they really need to be, grinning and chattering away at each other in the absence of an audience.

Stiles seems to be doing fine. That’s all Derek’s worried about, really. Except that he’s not sure he should’ve let Laura assign Stiles to work with Isaac because he’s suddenly remembering that time that he let Isaac and Erica drag him out clubbing and the two of them very nearly had dance floor sex with some guy, all three of them together, and doesn’t that mean Isaac is into guys? What if Isaac and Stiles get along so well that they celebrate surviving opening day by doing all the things that _Derek_ wants to do with Stiles? What if one day Isaac asks Derek to stand up at their wedding and Derek has to give a speech about how they fell in love on their first day at work while he’s desperately repressing the fact that he wishes he’d just dragged Stiles into a box stall while he had a chance?

Derek lets the anxiety chew at him for the rest of the day, because worst case scenarios and slow spirals into a pit of bitter regret are basically his specialties in life. By the time the place empties out and Derek is driving an unburdened Little back to the new barn to pull the harness, he’s all but resigned himself to the futility of his doomed love and he’s just hoping that he won’t stumble across them making out in the harness room or something.

He makes a point of coughing loudly into his fist as he drives Little up to the tie rail in the breezeway, but there are no eager new lovers spilling with kiss-chapped lips out of the harness room. In fact the only one in the barn at all is Stiles, who steps out of the harness room still fully in possession of all of his clothes and looking only as rumpled as anybody looks when they take a few of their winter layers off. He’s got a damp rag in his hand, which means he’s been wiping the sweat off the horses’ collars, and that shouldn’t actually be sexy but it _is_ because Derek has a problem, he is clearly far too involved with his work.

He’s far too involved with his work when he’d really just like to be involved with Stiles.

“So, first day went okay?” he asks as he starts unbuckling Little’s lines and headstall. He tries his best to sound nonchalant, like he’s not fishing for information about Stiles’ romantic status and exactly how attached he’s become to Isaac.

“Yeah, I think so,” Stiles says, and shrugs. “I mean, there were no runaway teams and none of our passengers were actually devoured by wild animals, so I think we did fine. Isaac’s a really awesome tour guide; I taped one of his tours on my phone so I can try to commit everything to memory.”

Derek doesn’t think about Stiles sitting at home, listening to the sound of Isaac’s voice on tape, over and over as he takes notes and maybe sketches little _Stiles + Isaac_ hearts in the margins. He _does not_ think about that _at all._

“Yeah, he’s uh… he’s great,” Derek says, weakly, and he’s fully prepared to sacrifice himself on the altar of the most horrible and obvious subject change in the history of all mankind, but he has literally nothing else to say. His mind goes perfectly blank, and there’s nothing in there except a sort of whistling wind sound and a claustrophobic sense of impending panic.

They’re alone in the barn, the two of them separated only by the admittedly ample width of Little’s back as Stiles steps up on the horse’s off side. Stiles starts tying up the line on that side while Derek slips the headstall off and hangs it over his elbow, and it’s nice, the steady sound of Stiles’ breathing and the jingle of harness hardware. Derek wants it every day, starting now and ending never.

Derek is acutely aware that if Isaac hasn’t already asked Stiles out, someone else probably will, because Stiles is kind of adorable and handsome and ridiculous, and this moment right here is possibly Derek’s only chance to make a move. It sounds simple, but it’s also impossible, because Derek has no idea how to talk to girls or guys or _anyone,_ really, and he’s really only ever had the kinds of relationships that end in tears, and that’s counting the _one date_ he went on with Jenny Finstock, and he’s still not even sure what caused her to have some kind of complete nervous breakdown halfway through appetizers at Chili’s, but he suspects it didn’t have anything to do with how badly they oversalted the fries.

So he’s still trying to think of something to say, _anything,_ when Stiles circles around and is suddenly right behind Derek, flicking the two buckles at Little’s girth line free so the belly band drops open, and Derek’s already reaching for the strap on the hames, which leaves Derek bending over a little and Stiles suddenly right behind him and Derek’s breath kind of stutters out of him in one startled whoosh.

The position is completely suggestive, to Derek, but Stiles is possibly straight or possibly just oblivious or _possibly_ just focused on his job like a _professional_. Derek is reasonably certain that the appropriate response right now is not to remove all of his clothes the way his brain kind of wants him to.

Stiles doesn’t seem to notice; he’s already run his arm up underneath the breeching and pulled it up and over Little’s rump to pile it together with the back pad, and his fingers just scratch absently at the horse’s withers as he waits for Derek to finish with the hames so he can pull the whole harness off. Unfortunately Derek’s fingers don’t seem to want to work anymore because Derek’s everything else is really aware that he’s one backwards step away from being literally in Stiles’ arms.

His brain supplies an incredibly vivid mental picture on demand: his body pressing back into Stiles’, his own murmured apology, and then Stiles’ free hand on his chest, Stiles’ voice in his ear telling him to stay, Derek’s head tipping back to bare his throat because Stiles’ breath is already washing against it and Derek wants— he wants—

The buckle comes free, but he’s not really entirely sure how he manages it, and then he’s not sure he wants to have managed it because Stiles pushes right up against him for a single torturous instant, just long enough to get a solid grip on the tops of each of the hames, and his breath is warm against the side of Derek’s neck just like he imagined, wanted, but then it’s over. Stiles pulls the whole harness off with one smooth movement and is gone, headed toward the harness room, tug chains rattling with each step.

“Hey, Isaac said there’s some kind of big dinner at your house tonight?” Stiles calls from inside the harness room, raising his voice over the racket he’s making as he piles Little’s harness up on its hook.

“Yeah,” Derek calls back, but he has to stop and clear his throat because he sounds almost as strangled as he feels.

Little drops his head obligingly as Derek pulls the collar off, and even swings right back to the tie rail like if only he had thumbs, he’d be really happy to clip the tie rope back on himself, to save Derek the trouble. Derek just coughs again, clips Little to the rail even though he’s the most absurdly gentlemanly horse on the place and he isn’t going anywhere without asking for his orders in writing first, and then Derek follows Stiles into the harness room, with the collar hanging from one elbow and the headstall dangling from the other.

“Yeah,” Derek repeats at a more normal volume, as he steps inside the smaller confines of the harness room. “Everybody’s invited, you should definitely come. It’s the official Hale Family Holy Shit We Survived Opening Day Dinner. Just don’t call it that in front of any of the younger kids. We don’t let them curse until they’ve earned it somehow.”

Stiles grins at him, reaches out and pulls the collar from his arm, wet rag already in hand to wipe the sweat from the inside so it’s all ready for tomorrow’s work. “And how’d you earn the privilege?” he asks. He passes over the rag while he hangs the collar from its hook.

Derek wraps the rag around the bit, wiping Little’s grass-tinged saliva from the metal before he hangs that up, too, tossing the rag into the wash bag in the corner and surveying the rest of the harness room with satisfaction. Stiles and Isaac took good care with Abbott and Costello’s gear, and everything looks just as it ought to. Stiles looks good here too, comfortable, like he’s just as at home in their barn as he is in his own living room.

“I was thirteen and Sawyer stepped on my foot, _hard,_ ” Derek says, grinning at the memory now that there’s a good decade standing between him and the agony. “I knew I was in the grown-up club when my mom didn’t scold me for the words that came out of my mouth. She just told me I probably shouldn’t stick my feet under any one-ton animals like that again, and then she drove me to the hospital. It was totally worth spending half the summer on crutches.”

Stiles laughs, and says, “My worst was my last summer at Deaton’s; he had this new Belgian foal with pneumonia and we were giving him antibiotic shots in his ass twice a day and that little guy was just _done_ with it. He kicked out one morning and caught me right in the balls. I never knew it was possible for anything to hurt that bad.”

Derek’s supposed to laugh, he’s pretty sure. It’s a little funny, in that horrifying kind of way that makes him want to wrap both shielding hands around his own package, just in case. But he doesn’t laugh, because his brain has latched completely onto the idea of Stiles’ balls, and it’s entirely an unconscious action, he will swear until his dying day, it’s just automatic the way his eyes flicker down the whole of Stiles’ body, and linger longingly for a moment on his crotch.

He could play it off, awkwardly, but it goes on just a beat too long, it’s horribly _blatant_ the way he’s just checked out Stiles’ body right in front of the guy, and he knows even before he’s managed to drag his eyes back up to more neutral territory that he’s absolutely busted. And sure, he’s been wanting to make some kind of move, but this is about the furthest thing from smooth; if anything, it’s a little pervy.

He’s already opening his mouth to apologize when he drags his reluctant gaze up to Stiles’ face, but whatever completely inadequate thing he might say goes right out the window, because Stiles is looking back. Like he’s _looking_ back. Sure, his mouth’s hanging open incredulously, but his eyes keep flickering between Derek’s eyes and Derek’s lips and he actually looks kind of like—

“Holy shit, really?” Stiles says, and his voice goes a little high and squeaky. “Are you serious with this? Have you seen you?”

Derek blinks and says, “What?” because he’s not following this conversation _at all_ but he thinks it’s really crucial that they not have any misunderstandings right at this exact moment because maybe this is what Stiles looks like when he’s pissed off and indignant, and kissing him the way Derek wants to is probably not the best idea. He doesn’t know what to say, _again,_ because he’s just not sure, and he can recognize this as a tipping point moment but he can also recognize that he’s really good at tipping things the wrong fucking way.

Stiles isn’t any help, because he’s just standing there with his mouth hanging open, still staring, so Derek tries the only thing he can think of. He takes a step closer, right into Stiles’ personal space, and he figures he’ll let Stiles decide which way things are going to tip, this time.

Stiles is apparently spectacular at tipping points. He tips himself right into Derek’s arms, tips Derek back over his heels until they’re both crashing into the wall, harness jangling like wind chimes on either side of them as the hanging gear parts around Derek’s shoulders. The harness settles around them on either side, and Stiles’ tongue is already inside Derek’s mouth and Stiles’ body is pressing him into the wall.

Derek shifts his feet apart, makes room for Stiles between his legs and reels Stiles all the way in by the hips and everything is good and hot and unbearable and Derek refuses to ever let it end.

There’s a cough from out in the breezeway, and Derek hears it, on some conscious level, he just doesn’t _care,_ couldn’t stop the desperate, whimpering noises escaping him even if he tried, and he’s not at all interested in trying because Stiles is mouthing at his throat and it’s fucking _amazing._ Derek’s pretty sure there are going to be hickeys and Laura is going to give him shit for the rest of his natural life, but it’s so beyond worth it, there aren’t even words in the English language.

“Uh, I’ll just take Little back to pasture for you, Derek,” Isaac calls, and there’s a sound of shod hooves against the breezeway’s rubber matting like Isaac’s already got a lead rope on him.

“Thanks, Isaac,” Derek manages to choke out, and when Stiles pulls back like he’s going to start laughing Derek yanks him back in, busies Stiles’ mouth with his own tongue instead.

“Are you guys coming to dinner?” Isaac says, and he’s standing right in the doorway, watching them, like he walks in on this sort of stuff all the time, which maybe he does because he’s with Erica and that’s kind of all that needs to be said on that subject right there.

Derek’s hand is splayed out against Stiles’ back, run up under his several layers of shirts, so he can feel the way that Stiles starts quivering, like he’s about to absolutely lose it, and Derek just would rather he doesn’t, would much rather Stiles stays _focused_ because they’re trying to accomplish something here.

“I’ll tell your mom you’ll be a little late,” Isaac says, answering himself. “Because if you’re going to fuck you should totally do it down here in the barn. That’s kind of hot, right? Just voice of experience, you know, your mom caught me last year with Erica and your cousin Blake in the bathroom and she was pretty pissed, like not about Blake but because we knocked some stuff over and it just seems like _you’re_ the only one who cares _that_ much about how tidy the barn is and—”

“Isaac, if you don’t leave I’m going to rip your throat out,” Derek says, and it sounds a little too breathy to be taken seriously so he adds, “with my _teeth_ ,” in as strident a tone as he can manage.

Stiles is seriously laughing now, but he’s doing it right against Derek’s neck and he’s also untucking Derek’s shirt, so it’s really difficult to hold it against him. “Go easy, man,” Stiles says. “He kind of had to put up with me asking unsubtle questions about you for like half the day. And the other half involved a lot of dreamy sighing. Like do you have _any idea_ how you look out there? Because I have a lot of thoughts on the subject.”

“Seriously,” Isaac agrees, solemnly, and then he backs slowly out the door with his hands up when he catches the glare that Derek shoots at him. “Okay, possessive, noted, striking the orgy off the ol’ Christmas list,” he mutters, and the words echo right into the room, followed by the heavier sound of Little’s footsteps, the both of them finally, blessedly, leaving the barn.

Stiles leans in for another kiss, and this one is long and slow, a quiet apology for things he doesn’t really need to apologize for. “I guess we should probably slow down a little, huh?” he says, although basically his entire body is plastered against Derek and there are no secrets between them in the literal sense because they can both tell that they’re both hard in their jeans. And sure, maybe Derek’s never done anything like this, never so fast, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to.

“I, uh,” he says, and pauses to bite at Stiles’ jaw, because he can do that now, when his higher brain function slips away, and that way Stiles will never notice the awkward pauses in conversation. “I was giving serious thought to sucking you off in a box stall.”

Stiles breathes against his throat, slow and steady like he’s trying to find his inner zen. He doesn’t say anything, but it’s not a rejection. Derek’s into second-guessing, but this particular awkward pause is unmistakable.

“You’re right,” Derek says, grabs Stiles’ hoodie and twists until Stiles is the one with his back to the wall. “Box stalls are kind of drafty. Here works just fine.”

Derek’s usually unfailingly punctual, but he makes them both _really_ late for dinner.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this, you might also want to check out my other horse AU, [Flying Changes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/644558). It's not related to this universe, but horses.
> 
> Because I like to do exhaustive research for everything ever… and okay, mostly because I think horse logging is possibly the most bad-ass, I have a few youtube videos if you have any interest in looking at the kind of work Derek was doing in this fic with log-skidding. What they’re doing in this video from a college class is essentially the kind of work Derek would be doing as a demonstration; nothing very heavy or strenuous, and something that’s easy for the horse to work on for hours. Also, the horse in this video is just freaking adorable okay.  
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezAycn2JxEg
> 
> This photo shows the kind of sledge/sleigh they’d be using, which is basically a flatbed typically used for delivering winter hay to cattle. Throw on a row of small hay bales and you’ve got comfortable seating!  
> http://www.steamboattoday.com/photos/2010/dec/19/35046/
> 
> And one more… this is basically what Abbott and Costello (and half the other horses on the farm :D) look like:  
> http://braymere.blogspot.com/2009/07/that-grey-percheron.html  
> I love that I am not the only person out there who appreciates a dappled butt enough to take close-up photos of it, for real.


End file.
